Intro by Brandon

The 1977 film Annie Hall is a bit of a paradox. It’s a romantic comedy that’s actually a tragedy about breaking up. It’s an intellectual movie that articulates how being too intellectual can kill a relationship. It’s also a commentary on how men can be jerks when they date younger women, written by a guy who had a thing for really young women. All in all, this is a great intellectual film that doesn’t fail to entertain, and it won four Oscars the year it came out, so it got the recognition it deserved.

The plot follows Alvy Singer, an intelligent and witty man, and the eponymous Annie Hall, an intelligent and witty woman. Most films would show these two falling in love, and this film does show that, but more than that, this film shows us why they fell out of love. Falling in love is just a backdrop; this is a story of what went wrong. This movie goes deeper with that theme than other similar films, and the writing is brilliant, so this is very much a film that holds up well today.

As the history of Woody Allen unfolded through the years, we eventually discovered him to be a bit… problematic. So yes, we get into that, and we spend some time talking about whether it’s OK to like good art from bad artists. We also spend some time talking about age gaps in romantic relationships and how mental health was viewed in the middle of the 20th Century.

So grab your favorite modern philosopher and a bunch of lobsters, we’re going to dive into this reflective and intellectual romantic comedy in this episode of Peculiar Picture Show, the podcast that talks about movies, maladies, and mental health.